Football club saw Lord Attenborough bring Hollywood’s royalty to watch his
team at Stamford Bridge — now the club is to repay his devotion by wearing
black armbands

His passion for Chelsea Football Club saw Lord Attenborough bring Hollywood’s royalty to watch his team at Stamford Bridge — now the club is to repay his devotion by wearing black armbands.

When Chelsea visits Everton on Saturday the players will wear the armbands as a mark of respect to the Oscar-winning actor and director, the club’s life president, who died on Sunday, aged 90.

A statement on the club’s website said: “He led a long and successful life and always found time for the things in life he loved most, one of which was Chelsea FC.”

Richard Attenborough was a lifelong supporter and a former director at Chelsea and shared his love for the club with his Hollywood friends, bringing everyone from John Wayne and Frank Sinatra to Laurence Olivier and John Mills. Players recalled the time he walked into the dressing room with screen icon Steve McQueen.

His links to the club began in the Forties, when he was offered the chance to train with the players to get fit for his role as a gangster in Brighton Rock.

A statement on the club’s official website read: “He led a long and successful life and always found time for the things in life he loved most, one of which was Chelsea FC. He will be greatly missed.”

The tributes to Attenborough flowed from across the globe yesterday. Steven Spielberg, the director, said he was “in an endless line of those who completely adored him”.

Sir Roger Moore, the actor, hailed him as “a wonderful and talented man”.

The British Academy of Film and Television Awards (Bafta) described him as a “Titan of British cinema” who set an example of “industry, skill and compassion” that the business would do well to live up to.” It’s statement added: “He was a monumental figure in Bafta’s history.”

Anthony Lake, the Unicef executive director, said the “world has lost not only a great voice, but a great soul”.

“He changed the lives of countless children,” he added. “We join his many admirers in honouring his life and mourning his loss.”

Sir Ben Kingsley, the actor who played the title role in Lord Attenborough’s Oscar-winning epic Gandhi, said the filmmaker gave him the role “with great grace and joy”. “He placed in me an absolute trust and in turn I placed an absolute trust in him, and grew to love him,” he said. “I, along with millions of others whom he touched through his life and work, will miss him dearly.”

Mia Farrow, with whom Attenborough starred in Guns at Batasi, called him “the kindest man I have ever had the privilege of working with. A Prince”.

One of the last people to see Lord Attenborough alive was Lalla Ward, the former Dr Who actress who said he had been “very frail” before his death.

“He was a positive force for all of us, a colossus,” she said.

His wife Sheila Sim, 92, who suffers from dementia, had been living with Attenborough at the care home Denville Hall in west London since June 2012. He is also survived by his son, Michael. The couple had two daughters, Charlotte, and Jane, who died in the 2004 Asian tsunami.